


Crooked Teeth

by insight_ful



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Abusive Parents, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Medieval, Alternate Universe - Royalty, Gay, Humanstuck, M/M, Multi, Period-Typical Homophobia, Period-Typical Racism, Pip pip cheerio, Plot, Princes & Princesses, Violence, Ye old days
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-16
Updated: 2017-05-01
Packaged: 2018-10-19 11:05:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 14,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10638555
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/insight_ful/pseuds/insight_ful
Summary: Being the heir to the throne is easier than you expected. What isn't so easy is dealing with all the drama among the servants. A certain group that was brought in is making your job awfully interesting, but you can't say that you dislike it. There's the loudmouthed liberal, Kankri. The weird one that converses better with animals than people, Tavros. And then there's the blacksmith, Dirk. He's almost as old as your father, which you find sort of hilarious.Regardless, this group has caused more drama than the castle has ever seen, as least since you moved in.Moral of the story is, Cronus Ampora, you're fucked. You're fucked, and you sort of like it.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> what the fuck

The word “honesty” is a very diverse word when it's used by someone in power. Honesty could be the truth, or it could be a blatant lie. Some will say they're being honest when they're trying to save someone from having their feelings hurt, and others are trying to keep themselves out of trouble. Unfortunately, the king of a small kingdom named Othrys has made a habit of the latter.

You know that deep in his heart he means well, but that is very, very deep. Buried beneath ancient walls of selfishness and pride. Even though he is your father, you're aware that he is a terrible man. The type of man that will murder an entire family just to take power, and will then expect the kingdom to like him. The type of man to raise the taxes of an already economically damaged territory, and have the audacity to have people can't pay them either killed or brought in to work in the castle without pay.

Deep down, you hate your father.

Deep down you're the exact opposite of your father. He's cold and unforgiving, and you're welcoming and friendly. He likes to kill or enslave people to solve his problems, and you have a habit of unlocking cells in the middle of the night when everyone is asleep.

While you aren't the perfect person yourself, you're much better than your dad. That's a nice thing to hear. People like you, at least for the most part, and you've been slowly becoming more popular throughout the kingdom.

There are of course still the rumors that will always start. Like the one which states that you take advantage of servants. You'll admit that your eyes may wander, but you aren't quite stupid enough to try to woo a maid. That would get you in trouble. Terrible trouble. Your father is practically afraid for you to find yourself a princess. He thinks that it'll give you the leverage to try and take over, and he knows that if you were determined, he wouldn't win. 

He knows that you're more liked than he is, and it makes him jealous. Out of two sons, you're the least liked. Coincidentally, you're also the least like him. 

Your brother, Eridan, is practically his clone. He tries to dress like him, act like him, and talk like him. He idolizes him. You don't understand it, since you raised him more than your father ever did.

Your mother died in childbirth, and at the time you were eight. Understandably, your father was out of commission for a while, and you were left to take care of your new brother yourself. Though as your father started to get back into the swing of things, he seemed to have forgotten that he'd gained a child. He was more concerned with figuring out how to get more money and land than being a parent. 

Thirteen years later, you’re twenty-one, and Eridan is thirteen. He walks around the castle like he owns the place, and you stay tucked away in your room a majority of the time. You only really come out for meals, important events, or to show new servants to their rooms.

That’s your job. Knights ride around and collect taxes from villages, as well as the people who couldn’t pay them, they bring them to the castle, and you talk to them.

Typically, most of the women go to the maid staff, and most of the men go to repairs. If they have a special talent that would be useful, or if you feel bad for them, you’ll put them on a different job. Sometimes when a kid is dragged into the equation, you’ll put them on the gardening staff just so they don’t have to do much. 

You, unlike your father, have feelings.

Unsurprisingly, today is one of the days that you have to assign people jobs. It happens once a month. A family can’t pay their taxes, and instead of killing one of their own they just ship them off to work. If you can’t pay one month's taxes, you stay at the castle for two, and if that continues you may just live there until you die.

It’s happened before. An older man was brought in, and without him his sons couldn’t work, so he just stayed there until he eventually passed from an illness. It was tragic.

You were awoken early in the morning by a maid knocking on your door as usual. You can’t wake up before noon unless someone manually gets you up, so it’s a daily routine. You roll out of your bed, change clothes, and don your crown. While you personally don’t care much for wearing your crown, your father has made it clear that you have to when you’re roaming the castle. He says that it makes you seem more powerful. Though you’re pretty sure that you look powerful enough as is compared to all the sad servants.

You waste about fifteen minutes before leaving your room, mostly just from you looking at your reflection, fixing your hair, and humming. You’ve always been fairly slow to get ready anyway.

When you do finally come out, it’s obvious that it’s tax day. Maids are hurrying about, cleaning up whatever they can and making sure that the empty rooms are livable. Even on the third floor, which you’ve never brought a servant to live, they are doing what they can. However you don’t blame them, you’d like the building to be clean too if you were a servant coming in to live for two months.

It’s likely that they won’t show up for another hour at least, so you venture to the dining hall and get yourself a meal.

The dining hall is just one big cafeteria on the first floor, meant to be able to feed all of the servants. There is a royal dining room upstairs, but you prefer to just get your food and take it there yourself. It gives you more of an excuse to walk around and see people. 

Since you’re arguably the most liked of the royal family, most tend not to shy away from you when you walk about. Some still do, mostly the new ones or ones with more sad pasts, but for the most part you can wander the castle with no problem at all.

The meal today is a normal one. Nothing special. Just some things grown in a nearby farm and ham. You take your food from a cook and leave, walking around the halls. You hold your plate with one hand, and eat with the other.

You may be the most liked, but you aren't the neatest of the royals. Not by a long shot. That would probably have to go to your brother. He's not very organized either, but he's a lot cleaner and has more manners. He's also just generally smarter.

When you were his age, your father was too busy with trying to take over a kingdom to worry with giving you an education. He just let you raise your brother in peace. Though after he became king, Eridan got the best education available. Needless to say, you can't even read, but your brother is already taking interest in science. You can't say that you're mad, but it gets on your nerves that you can't even read a book by yourself. At least you can spell your name.

You walk down the center of a hallway, maids going to and from around you, and you just look down at your plate. You're trying to pass the time before the new servants arrive. You have no other plans for the day.

A knight passes by you, dragging along a man that you recognize as a tailor. You have no idea what he did, or where he's being taken, but you give him a sympathetic smile as you walk by each other. He was your favorite from a group that came in last month. Mostly because he spit in your face when you complimented his attitude. He sure showed you.

Sure, the spit was gross, but it was hilarious.

You’re finished with your meal before you can ever reach the royal dining room, so instead of finishing the trip, you just turn back around to take your empty plate back to be washed. No need to walk more than you need to, though you are already doing so by getting your food yourself.

Taking the same path that you used on the way out, you venture back towards the kitchen. You look at the walls as you do so, observing the hangings and occasional paintings. There isn’t much, since the people that lived in the castle before had no relation to you, and your father ordered anything regarding their family history to be taken down and burned. Now it’s just tapestries with no meaning, and paintings of landscapes or religious figures. Nothing very interesting, in your opinion.

The door to the kitchen is in the process of swinging shut when you slip through it, bumping your shoulder on the doorway on your way in. You drop your plate on a stack of other dirty ones, and walk back out, taking a new path this time.

You walk towards the front of the castle this time, planning on going outside and waiting for the newcomers to arrive. It shouldn’t be too long now. The knights always head out before the sun even rises to begin, starting at the point furthest from the castle, and making their way back. 

They usually don't run into any problems. 

Your wait really isn't long, seeing as just when you go to sit down outside, the gates are pulled open and the horses and knights pulling along a cart ride in. There are quite a few people in the cart, some looking defeated and others looking angry. 

One of the knights climbs off of his horse and goes to the back of the cart, helping and pulling people off of it. A few climb off with his help, then a boy completely ignored his offer for help, slowly climbing off himself. The knight attempts to help him anyway, and you see why. His right leg is wooden from the knee down. Though the boy behind him swats the knights hand away, claiming that, “If he doesn't want to be touched, he shouldn't be.”

This boy catches your attention. He looks too clean to be the type unable to pay taxes. His clothes are spotless, and his hair looks soft. You wonder how he ended up in this situation.

When he follows the other off, he also denies the help, unsurprisingly. He just follows the boy with the wooden leg, standing beside him in the line that was forming against the nearest wall. He's nearly a head shorter than the wooden boy.

You watch as the last few climb off, including one with practically white hair, which you find odd. His skin tone is dark enough that it doesn't look even a bit natural. He must stay outside a lot. Though what really catches your attention about him is the way he climbs off. 

He looks at the knight and spits in his face. Or, his helmet. The knight had his face guard down at the time.

This of course prompted a bit of a fight to start. You quickly came forward, pushing yourself between the knight and the blond right as a sword is drawn. You give the knight a warning look, and after he's obviously got the memo, he puts his sword away. You lift what covers his face, getting a good look at him before dismissing him. By then, the blond had already fallen into line.

You sigh, scratching your hairline as you look over the newcomers.

Figuring that you might as well start with the first ones off, you go to one end of the line. You ask a short series of questions, ones that you'll ask everyone.

“What are you good at?”

“What can't you do?”

And, “What do you hope to do?”

You decide where everyone goes based on their answers. There is a group of servants waiting nearby to take the newcomers to their rooms, and show them their jobs once you assign one to them.

The first two are women, both of which go to maid service, mainly because neither of them will look you in the eye or give an answer of more than three words. 

The next one is a man that claims to be good at sewing, so you assign him to tailoring.

Then comes the boy with the wooden leg. He looks younger than you. Sixteen, maybe. And though he doesn't look you in the eyes either, and he doesn't seem very confident, he answers you without you having to ask.

“I'm good with animals and I can't organize, and I want to work with horses.”

You just stare at him for a minute, assessing him. Even though he has half of a leg missing, he should be able to work in the stables. He won't have to ride anything, just feed and groom. It's easy enough, so that's where you send him.

Next is the clean one. He actually waits for you to speak, but he gives more than you ask for.

“My name is Kankri Vantas. I've gotten the best education available for my families funding, and I am able to read write, and memorize with ease. I also take pride in being confident and capable. Though I will admit that I am not skilled in manual labor. I would like to have a quiet and neat task,” he rattles it all off and what feels like one breath, and you aren't sure how he does it.

Obviously, he is smart. Possibly even smarter than you. Well, there is no possibly to it. In intellect, he has you beat.

“Library,” you point him towards the group of servants, and move on. 

The next few go as usual. An abundance of maids and repairmen with a few others mixed in. You're surprised when you come to the blond and he doesn't talk to you. You have to ask the first question three times before he gives an answer.

Just a simple, “I can build.”

His second is a bit longer, but not any more impressive, “I can't clean anything.”

And the third is just plain boring. “Fight.”

He wants to fight. Unfortunately for him, none of the servants get to be knights or anything of the sort. Your father made that very clear when he gave you the job.

It doesn't take much thinking to find a place for the blond, so you tell him repairs. But in particular you give him defensive repairs. So he will get to fix weapons, shields, armor, and any other equipment used for fights. Basically, he will get to be a blacksmith. He just won't get to make anything of his own.

He was the last one, so you send him to follow a servant along. You dismiss the extra servants that had been hanging around. One of the women smile at you, to which you smile back at. She seems happy enough. At least one person is today.

Your job is almost over for the day. All that’s left to do is give the newcomers some time to settle in, and then you must go around and give them an “introduction”.

Really, the introduction is just you attempting to get on their good side so that they’ll actually do work. You deliver clothes to them, tell them what they’ll be expected to do, and then you leave. It isn’t very hard. Usually it’s just boring.

To let the time pass by faster you go back to the kitchen, snacking on things and doing what may or may not be considered flirting with many of the women working there. By now they’re probably used to that from you. Some of them tend not to even notice it, and neither do you. You’ve grown used to talking to them in that way.

Your favorite maid, one which refuses to tell you her name, enters not long after you do. She goes to start cleaning up the dishes from breakfast, and you watch her from the other side of the room. She knows that she's your favorite. Mainly because of the mystery she hold. Since you don't even know her name, you're dying to know more. But today feels like a day to leave her alone. She might have to clean up a newcomers vomit later, so she deserves a nice morning.

It isn't rare for the new people to get sick on their first day. Some overeat, some get upset, and some come in already ill. There's nothing you can do about that, so you just have to let them throw up if they feel the need. You're not the one that has to deal with it.

None of the cooks seem to get angry with you for eating what was probably another whole meal's worth of “snacks”, and they usually don’t when you do so. Everyone in the castle gets fed well enough that it isn’t a big concern. Nobody is missing out because of what you take, so nobody complains. They could just as easily eat extra, and some of them probably do. You see nothing wrong with doing it yourself.

The only person ever to comment on it was Eridan, and that was just a month or two after you’d relocated to the castle, and he was just curious. Since then, nothing.

After what you estimate to be about thirty minutes of snacking and having small conversations, you dismiss yourself. People should be settling into their rooms by now, and they won’t actually have to work until tomorrow. Mainly because when your father first took over and made the new tax laws, most of the people that had to work on the first day ended up doing something stress induced and throwing something off. Including once projectile vomiting on Eridan while helping make him a new outfit. Tragic.

For Eridan at least. You laughed about it for what felt like hours. It was hilarious.

Now though, you don’t have those problems. Everyone gets a day to sit around and adjust, so the vomit is kept to a minimum. Everyone prefers it that way.

After giving a brief goodbye to the ladies in the kitchen, you leave. One of the servants kept track of where everyone was placed, so you track him down and ask him about it. You find him in the library, getting help from a knight there. One that knew how to read. Unfortunately, all the servant can do is copy things down.

You approach them, and instead of speaking he just hands you the paper. Written on it are names, jobs, and rooms. All in order of how you assigned them earlier. You only recognize one name, since only one told you theirs. Kankri Vantas. Well, Kankri Vantas II. You don’t feel like getting that technical about it though. 

The rest? You draw up nothing in your mind. Jonathan? No. William? That’s just too basic. Theodoric? Well, you haven’t ever heard that one before, but you still don’t know who the name belongs to. You suppose you’ll just find out when you pay everyone a visit.

You head down towards the laundry room, hoping that they have a cart of clothes ready for you. There is no way that you’re making more than one trip there. You’d rather just push around all of the clothes at once.

So you do. While they didn’t have a cart ready for you, they quickly set up one upon request. They let you have it and hold the door open for you, then you’re on your merry way.

Placing the paper you’d received from the library earlier on top of one of the stacks of clothes, men’s shirts specifically, you begin your trek to the first name on the list. You don’t get too excited for it. It’s one of the women you assigned to be a maid. You remember the first few not looking at you when you spoke to them. They’ll probably be boring introductions.

When you stop by the first room, which isn’t very far from the laundry room, you find it empty. You have no idea where the woman could have wandered off to, nor do you care. You just throw a dress onto the bed and continue on. 

The second woman is present, but she once again doesn’t look at you. She simply grabs herself a dress off of the cart and closes her door. She doesn’t seem to be ready for much.

The third is also absent from her room, so you do the same as before. Toss a dress in and save the rest for later. Then when you look down at your list you start to get interested. The first male name on the list is next, and that should be the one with the wooden leg. Tavros Nitram. Working in the stables. You're actually interested to meet him.

His room is closer to the west side of the castle, seeing as he’ll spend a majority of his time in the stables, and that's where they are. You smile down at your paper while you walk, using the cart to both hold the clothes, and your weight. Sure, you're doing something, but you still find little ways to be lazy.

Your walk there isn't a long one, since you'd been headed in that direction anyway because of the placement of the maids rooms. A few minutes at most.

The numbers nailed onto the doors count up all the way to 502, which matches the one printed on the paper. He managed to snag the room at the very end of the corridor, right next to a door leading outside. He's lucky in that regard. Not just because of the short distance, but also because he has a window inside.

You stop your cart and look at the door, pursing your lips. You think for a moment about how to introduce yourself, and you quickly come up with something.

Three solid knocks on the wooden door later you can hear movement. In specific, you can hear the little click of what you assume is the wooden leg against the stone floor. Otherwise you hear nothing.

The door is pulled open, to which you begin.

“Hello, my name is Cronus Ampora, though I'm sure you know that,” you bow, reaching up to tilt your crown as if it was a hat. Though instead of just tipping it, you go a step further. You pull it off your head, flipping it in your hand so that you're holding it properly, and then promptly place it gently on the top of Tavros’ head.

His eyes cross as he tries to look up at what you're doing, and the crown on his head. When he realizes that, his eyes widen as if you'd just placed a bag of gold on his head instead. Which you technically did. The crown was probably equivalent to three years of taxes, and Tavros couldn't even pay a month's worth. It was probably worth more money than he'd ever even thought of.

Widened eyes look down from their crossed position to meet yours instead, and you find yourself just staring into what looks like the color of mud. Mud that's associated with good memories.

Like when you were a child and would go play outside after it had rained, and a mud puddle could be entertainment for hours on end. You can still distinctly remember putting leaves in mud puddles and making up stories about how they were boats, and what they were doing.

Somehow, the guy with the wooden leg has eyes the color of a memory.

Instead of saying anything more, you just smile at him, your teeth perfect except for your canines. They're just crooked enough to look off, but you don't mind. A girl once told you that it was cute.

The crown doesn't stay on Tavros’ head long. He quickly, yet carefully, takes it off and hands it back to you.

He stutters out something along the lines of, “I'm too clumsy to have this,” so you just nod and put it back on your own head. You gesture towards the cart once your hands are free.

“Tavros, as interesting as it is to see you in pants with one leg cut off at the knee, you need to get some new clothes. Two shirts and two pairs of pants. Find what you think will fit you the best. You may ask a tailor to do something for your leg later.”

Tavros nods, looking at the cart and hesitantly stepping towards it. He starts sifting through the stacks after figuring out that the biggest clothes seem to be at the bottom. He looks in the middle, pulling out two shirts. He lets one unfold so that he can hold it up to himself to see how it might fit. He's satisfied with it, so he goes on to look at the pants.

You watch him carefully, observing the way he does everything like he could break something in the process. You think that maybe he did break things at home quite often, and maybe he got in trouble for it. That or he's just scared to mess up in front of a prince. It could be either or both.

After collecting what you instructed him to, he steps back, new clothes in hand. He looks at you expectantly, but he doesn't look you in the eyes. You're pretty sure that he's looking at your mouth instead. So, you lick your top row of teeth before talking, not wanting him to find something stuck between them or something.

“Is there anything you know of that you'll need? Or anything you can't have?”

Though allergies aren't really a thing quite yet, you know about some people being intolerant of certain things. For instance, your mouth gets all tingly and sometimes your tongue gets bigger when you eat corn. You've never known why, but you're careful not to eat it anymore.

Tavros seems to think for a moment, and he slowly nods, “Grapes. I can't eat them.”

So that means that he can't have any jams or wines. Poor guy.

You nod, taking a mental note of that. Hopefully you won't forget. You once forgot that a maid couldn't eat eggs, and you brought her some the very next day. She nearly slapped you.

You doubt that Tavros would get that mad at you for a simple mistake, but you still don't want to make one. You would rather be well liked. Being well liked is an important part of being a prince and up and coming king. You really do not want to end up like your father. A mean old man that nobody likes.

“It’s been nice meeting you, Tavros. Feel free to show yourself around the castle at your own pace. You won’t have to do anything until tomorrow. Someone from the stables should stop by and show you what to do. You’ll be able to find me if you need me,” you pat him on the shoulder and start pushing the cart back along the halls. A look at your list shows you that the next to visit is Kankri Vantas. Assigned to the library.

Something tells you that paying him a visit will be interesting.

He was, after all, the one that gave you a full paragraph introduction to himself rather than just the few words that everyone else gave. You're pretty sure that putting him on a library job was a good idea.

The library isn’t very far, and you’re pretty sure that Kankri’s room is one of the few across from it. These newcomers are getting awfully lucky, getting rooms close to their jobs. Though that’s probably happening because you convinced your father to let a big group go recently, mainly some that had been around for three or more months. It freed up a lot of space, and now you’re just repopulating it.

The library is on the west wing, but it’s closer to the middle of the castle. You stroll that way, leaving behind Tavros and his weird behavior. Though you have to admit you found it a little bit interesting. You’ll be talking to him again sometime.

You look out some of the windows as you pass them by, estimating that it was nearing noon, since you couldn’t see the sun. It must have been up pretty high, but not enough time had passed yet for it to be any later than that.

You approach the library, but you focus on the opposite side of the hall, looking for the correct room. When you knock on the door with numbers that match the ones on the paper, you get no answer. You slowly crack the door open to see if Kankri was inside and just keeping to himself, you find exactly that.

The brunet is curled up in the middle of the little bed in the corner of the room. You can’t tell for sure from the door, but you think he’s shaking.

You’ve never been a very clever man, so instead of leaving the emotional librarian alone for the time being, you step inside and slowly close the door behind yourself. You can’t tell if he heard you enter or not, but when you gently sit yourself down on the edge of his bed, he seizes up hard enough that you’re pretty sure that he didn’t.

Poor Kankri tenses up and freezes, even holding his breath. You sit stupidly for a moment before hesitantly putting a hand on his shoulder. You speak, attempting to be quiet and soft in your voice, “Kankri Vantas. Has the best education his family could afford. Can read, write, and is most likely smarter than the soon-to-be king.”

Over the years you’ve learned that one of the best ways for you to cheer people up is by proving that you actually listened to them. It’s easy to feel small in a castle with royalty and so many people. Even you sometimes feel unimportant. Usually not for long though.

Kankri had started breathing again at some point, though his shallow little breaths were laced with quiet sniffles and what you are assume are hiccups. You glance at the door with a sigh. This just reminds you of your brother when he gets upset. Though a majority of the time he just has outbursts, there are rare moments where he will give in and cry. Usually when your father does something along the lines of saying that he doesn’t like him, or that he doesn’t matter. It, unfortunately, happens more than it ever should.

In those times, you usually find yourself sitting with Eridan and hugging him until he gets fed up with it. While you’re almost always annoyed with your brother, you still love him at least a little.

Even though Kankri, obviously, isn’t your brother, you feel sorry for him. So you look down at his curled up form and start running your fingers through his curly hair. Surprisingly, you only hit one or two tangles as you do so. Some time passes with just you trying to comfort this stranger, but you don’t care how much you end up wasting. It’s more worth it to make some of the people that are forced to be here happy than it is to just throw clothes at them.

You do it partly because it will give you a good reputation, and partly because it could give you a friendship. You can’t be completely selfless. You have your reasons for just about everything.

You have no clue how long you sit in there with him, but you do know that you spent long enough to need to scoot back and lean against the wall, and he got comfortable enough with you to use your thigh as a pillow of sorts. You don’t know why, but you blame it on the fact that you did take up a good portion of his bed, and he didn’t have a pillow yet.

You fall asleep with your fingers tangled in his hair and your back against the wall that night.

You’re sure to get an earful from your father in the morning. You sure as hell hope that a maid thought enough to finish delivering clothes.


	2. Chapter 2

When you wake up in the morning you have the vague feeling of being curled up against someone. But once you're conscious enough to open your eyes and process thoughts, you realize just how vague that feeling was. You weren't curled up against anyone at all. You'd managed to grab onto the blankets while you slept and spoon them.

It doesn't take long to realize that you aren't in your room, and you quickly remember why. Kankri. You tried to calm him down. You wonder how early it must be. It must have been pretty early when you fell asleep, and even you can't sleep for more than twelve hours. At the latest, its eight.

Kankri is no longer in his room, but after you sit up and rub your eyes, collecting your crown from where it fell off onto the bed, you can see a note on the door.

It takes you longer than you'd like to admit to get up and look at it, but when you do you don't know the point. It states: “I do not need your charity”, but you can't read it anyway. He may as well have just left you a note in Mandarin.

Well, you can read the first three words, but the rest are beyond your ability. It's sort of depressing.

Oh well. For now you need to get up and go to your room to change before you get screamed at for not completing your job, or being in your room all night. You just hope that your father doesn't take it too seriously. And therefore, your really hope that he isn't hungover. His punishments are always worse when he's hungover.

You shuffle out of the room, stifling a yawn as you do your best to straighten out your bed head.

It's early enough that there are very few people roaming the halls, so you think you might get off easy. You just have to get up to your room, and act like nothing happened. No problem!

You get up the first flight of stairs before you run into your brother. He only comes up to your shoulder since he's still young, but damn if he doesn't feel like a huge guy when he bumps into you.

He lets out a relieved sigh and looks up at you, reaching his slightly too feminine hand up to flick your nose.

“Dualscar sent me looking for you!” He whisper yells at you, furrowing his brows just like you do when you're angry. That isn't what you're focused on though. Your father sent him to find you.

You're also focused on how stupid you think it is that Eridan calls your dad by his nickname. Not even his actual name, or just dad. Dualscar. You don't get it, nor do you like it.

“How angry is he?” You slide your crown on to aid in keeping your hair out of your face. The face that Eridan makes in response to your question does not bode well for you.

Instead of giving you a verbal answer, Eridan just hugs you, pressing his face into your shoulder. He quickly recoils though, complaining that you smell terrible. Whether you do or not, you don't know.

What you're most concerned about is that he hugged you. Sure, he's over dramatic, and could just be trying to scare you, but he never hugs you. Well, he does sometimes, but it's very rare. The king must be steaming. Steaming and probably with a headache.

Eridan points his thumb up the stairs leading to the third floor, “He is sayin’ that he’s gonna whip you again.”

God, that's the worst. It doesn't happen often, thankfully, but it hurts like hell. He has a big, leather whip, and he’ll make you take off your shirt so that he can lash you with it. You have scars on your back to prove it.

“Just go read, little man, I'll talk to him,” you put on your best ‘I'm a strong guy’ face and ruffle his hair, sending him off down to the library.

Meanwhile, you continue up the stairs, a little less bounce in your step now. You know what's coming, and you know how to handle it. At least you're pretty sure that you do.

You walk down the corridor towards your father's room, pushing the door open without knocking, and walking inside. He's pacing around, mumbling to himself about something that you can't quite hear. He only noticed when you come inside when you close the door. He turns towards you, and swiftly starts your way.

Your father is bigger than you, and a little stronger too, and that isn't a good thing. He stops in front of you, slaps you across the face, and takes the second that you're disoriented to grab the collar of your shirt and lift you up.

He presses your back against the wooden door, and you let out a grunt of disapproval as he holds you there.

And of course, he starts yelling at you at such levels that little flecks of his spit hit your face on certain letters.

“Cronus, you're a prince! A damn prince! And you can't even stay in your own room for a night! Or finish a simple job! I've had enough of it. Are we clear?” He's close enough to your face that you can feel the air puffing out his nose with his heavy breaths.

Turning your head to the side, you huff, “I fell asleep in someone's room. I was talking to them.”

Apparently that was the wrong answer. Your father drops you, poking a finger to your chest, “Throne room. Now!”

He pulls you out of the way just long enough to pull open the door and throw you out.

You land with a huff on the stone floor, your crown sliding off your head and clattering to be floor. A maid that was going down the hall carefully picks it up for you, and even offers you a hand as held up. You accept, pulling yourself up off of your sore butt and putting your crown back on.

Rather than disobeying your father and getting yourself in more trouble, you go down the stairs, all the way down to the first floor. You go straight to the throne room, and sit down in yours. A smaller one to the side of the center. You don't use this room often, so you're a bit nervous about why he sent you there.

You find yourself drifting off into thought about it, fiddling with your fingers in your lap as you wait. You've never been able to sit still very long.

“On your feet,” your father’s voice breaks the silence and startles you, “Shirt off.”

You should have expected this. He wanted to lash you, but didn't want to risk getting any blood around his room. He's got the whip attached to his belt, and just it's presence is enough to make you uncomfortable.

Following his orders you stand, and start undoing the front of your shirt, starting at the neck and going down. By the time you're halfway down, servants start wandering through the door. Some look scared, and others just have widened eyes, watching you, the prince, take off your shirt in front of all of them.

Once it's off, you toss it back onto your seat, standing in front of your dad with your eyes trained on the ground. Apparently, he had a maid tell as many others as possible to spread the word to come to the throne room.

You think you may have changed your mind. You hate your father all of the time. He's a terrible man.

He instructs you to get on your knees and lean on his throne, so you do, resting your head on the plush seat. If you're going to get whipped, you're at least going to have a comfortable pillow. 

Some standing around occurs, your dad pacing around as he waits for more people to come. He wants as many as possible to see this.

The muscles on your back twitch in anticipation, and you can feel eyes on you. While you would normally feel great about that, now you don't. They're not staring for any good reason. They're pitying you.

Your fathers booming voice cuts through their quiet murmuring after he's satisfied with the people in the room, though you can hear more still shuffling in.

“The prince has broken one too many rules, and skipped out on his work enough to be worth punishment. You have gathered here to witness what happens to those who break rules,” he wastes no time ripping that whip off of his belt and snapping it over your back.

The stinging pain you feel drowns out the gasp from the people in the room. You suck in a sharp breath from between your teeth, trying your best not to cry. Damn it hurts though.

Another lash comes, and the third is hard enough to split your skin. You can feel a few trails of blood start down from it before the fourth strike hits. That one you react to. You yelp, arching your back in a futile attempt to get away from it. You can already feel the bruises forming alongside the open line on your back.

Before your father decides to stop, you've counted fifteen hits, three of which you think split skin, and one that was at an angle that allowed the thin little end of the whip to wrap around and hit you just about your nipple.

On the bright side, it did avoid your nipple. It could be worse.

Being the disgusting man that he is, your father just drops the whip at your side and walks out of the room, the servants clearing a path for him to the door. They don't want to risk anything now.

Slowly, they start clearing out too, while you sit crying onto the seat of a throne, your back red and swollen. You've hidden your face in the bend of your elbow, trying to just seem like you're sitting there and waiting for everyone to leave.

Your back gives away your ragged breathing though, and people can probably tell.

You're unsure how long it is before most everyone is gone, five minutes at the least, but you feel a hand gently placed on your bicep.

Very, very gently. Like whoever touched you is afraid to break you.

You don't move, just sitting there. The person attached to the hand kneels down next to you, you think, and they start moving their hand slowly up and down your bicep and shoulder, probably trying to comfort you.

Not long after, another hand is placed on your other shoulder. This one is smaller, you can tell, and softer as well. Maybe it's a girl. You wait until you're done crying to find out.

You lift your head, first looking to the left, where the owner of the first hand was, and you find Tavros. He gives you a sympathetic smile, crooked teeth showing and making you feel a little better.

On your right is none other than Kankri Vantas. The one that sort of got you into this mess. He does not offer you a smile. Instead he gives you a blunt, “Let's go and patch you up.”

He and Tavros half pull, half help you to your feet. Kankri grabs your shirt and plucks your crown off your head, while Tavros wraps your arm around his shoulders and tries to support you while you walk. He might be the bigger of the two of them, but since he's missing a leg, you don't know why he got that job.

Besides, you could walk just fine on your own.

The only reason you aren't is because you aren't going to deny having your arm around the broad shoulders of a stable keep.

You didn't mean for that to sound quite so… intimate, really.

Tavros just has really nice shoulders is all. You can’t deny that. At least you assume they’re nice shoulders, since you’ve only seen them clothed. They look pretty nice, and not to mention feel it.

You’d think that you’d be more focused on the pain in your back than how attractive a man’s shoulders are, but your priorities are all out of whack. They have been for awhile.

You’re fairly certain that Tavros is helping you back to his room, which you’re glad for. You’d rather go there than Kankri’s, considering that’s what got you into trouble in the first place. No need to risk any more. The halls seem to stretch out forever with your back in the shape that it is though, and it makes you wish that you were going to Kankri’s. It’d be closer.

Thankfully though, Kankri is still tagging along, his shorter legs moving the smallest fraction faster than yours and Tavros’ to keep up. He still carries your shirt, which he’s folded up neatly, and placed the crown on top of. He must really be a neat person to be worried about folding your shirt while your back is bleeding. Not that you’re complaining.

Kankri pulls ahead the closer you get, and he pushes Tavros’ door open so you two can enter. They must have talked beforehand, since he knew the exact door to go to. Either that or you tuned out enough not to notice anything they may have said.

Tavros stumbles his way over to his bed, helping you lay down on your stomach. He lets you hug his pillow, and he sits down on the edge of the bed next to you. He sighed, rubbing his knee and looking at Kankri who moved across the room to sit your things down on top of a small dresser.

“I am going to go get a few things to clean him up with. You just stay here and watch him,” Kankri was out the door just as quick as he was in, and you were left on an uncomfortable bed.

The stable keeper grabbed a rag from nearby, using it to carefully wipe away the blood that ran down your back. He’s careful about everything. It makes you wonder how much he broke as a child for him to act like that. He’s soft, gentle, and precise about every little thing that he does, and it makes a shiver run down your spine.

He mutters out an apology, thinking that he must have hurt you or something, but you just grunt in response. You find it all sort of relaxing. If you pretend that your back isn’t split open, and that you aren’t in pain, it’s just like he’s running his hands across your back to get you to sleep. You might just have to assign a maid to do that from time to time because it feels amazing.

You almost do fall asleep before Kankri comes busting through the door, jabbering about something. You hear the grunts of another man, and when you lift up your head to see what is going on, you see the man that spit on a knight carrying a bucket of water for Kankri. He puts it on the ground next to the bed and leaves, not giving any conversation.

Kankri dumps what he carried onto the bed, and you spot a few key items. Such as a bottle of alcohol, clean rags, and bandages. You have no clue what the other things are or what they’re for, but you trust that Kanri does. Why else would he bring them along?

“Tavros, if you would, please wet one of these clean rags and continue cleaning off his back with it. Just avoid the open wounds,” Kankri sits down next to Tavros, but far enough away that he’s next to your thighs. He grabs a rag of his own and the alcohol, saving the rag for later as he opens the bottle.

“You’re ‘gonna kill me,” you press your face into the pillow once again. You absolutely hate having alcohol put on any cuts. It burns.

Kankri retorts with, “No, I’m going to do the opposite of that.”

He’s not wrong. You could easily get an infection, and it could paralyze you, and then where would you be? You decide to stop complaining and just let it happen.

As Kankri pours a generous amount of alcohol over the first wound, you suck in a breath, squirming around. Tavros withdraws his hand from your back, and you can feel him lean over to drape the rag he used over the side of the bucket of water. When he sits back up, you move a hand away from your pillow to grab for his. This proves to be more difficult than expected since you aren’t actually looking at him.

He does seem to get the message though. He grabs your hand and lays both of yours on his knee, which is pulled up onto the bed for comfort.

A laugh escapes Tavros’ mouth when you squeeze his hand, and he just squeezes back, “You know, I didn’t ever think that I’d have the prince in my room, or my bed, or squeezing my hand like he’s giving birth, but all of those things happened.”

Kankri doesn’t answer, but you manage your own pained laugh into the pillow. Kankri starts using the rag to wipe away blood sitting in the marks on your back, which arguably hurts more than the alcohol. He finished with the first cut and puts the rag down, doing something with the rest of the things that he brought in.

Tavros isn’t doing much to help him. He’s just around for moral support, and because you’re in his room. He doesn’t have much else to do yet besides sit around.

After a minute, you feel a sharp poke at your back, and then something sliding through your skin. You’re too scared to squirm around, but you yank Tavros’ hand up next to your face. You hold it with both of yours, squeezing so hard that you hear a few pops.

“Uh,” Tavros practically squeaks, “You’re just getting stitches, please don’t break my hand.”

He stops for a second before quickly adding “your highness”, to which you just give a little laugh at.

You do relax your hands, allowing Tavros enough freedom to wiggle his fingers, which he briefly does. It distracts you while Kankri stitches up one of the wounds on your back. He works quickly, and Tavros talks to you and lets you play with his fingers as entertainment.

“You know, your highness, you shouldn’t let him treat you like that. You’re going to be a king one day too. Everyone would like you better anyway, I think,” Tavros starts a little ramble, which you only partially listen to. “You’ll make a much better king. I can already tell that you’re nicer. Kankri told me about what you did last night. Well… he also told me about how problematic it was, but if you ask me, it was sweet.”

It is then that Kankri cuts in, “Tavros, I went over this with you. It was problematic. He assumed that because I was upset, he had the right to come into my room and put his hands all over me! Look where that got him. I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself, and if he didn’t think otherwise we wouldn’t be in this situation.”

You grunt when Kankri cuts off the end of what he used to stitch you up and tied a knot. He pulled it all tighter when he did so, which hurt. It hurt a lot. You once again squeezed at Tavros’ hand, and he allowed you to without complaint.

“Tavros,” you pull his hand close to your mouth for no other reason besides getting it closer, “You can call me Cronus. Your highness sounds odd when I’m breaking your hand.”

That gets a laugh out of him. More of a snort, really. Even Kankri chuckles, though it’s faint and he stops himself. He’s the serious type, you suppose.

You’re going to crack him one day. You’re determined now, and it’s only a matter of time.

Once the first set of stitches is in, Kankri cleans off the next wound, not suturing it. He claims that it isn’t big enough to need it. The third one does get stitched up though, but Tavros reports that it’s smaller than the first one was. In order to ensure that everything is clean Kankri wipes everything down with more alcohol, and then instructs you to sit up.

You do with a little held from Tavros, and then Kankri makes you sit still so he can wrap bandages around your chest. Tavros helps, holding the start until it’s stationary, and then making sure that nothing in the front overlapped too much while Kankri focused on the back.

Seeing the opportunity, you take the time to stare at Tavros. He’s in front of you, and he’s staring down at your chest, so you don’t think he will notice. You just want to take in his features.

Like the few little freckles scattered across his cheeks, but not his nose. Or the way that he has a minimum of four different cowlicks making his hair stick up towards the back. Or maybe even the way his nose twitches when he’s focused. That part is a little funny.

“Your nose is twitching,” you say, lifting a hand to point at it, “Every few seconds.”

Tavros looks up at you, though he keeps his head tilted down, “It is?”

“Well, not anymore,” you shrug a little, but you quickly grow to regret it because of the pain it sends down your back.

Kankri mumbles something about being still, and Tavros offers you a hand again, probably seeing the look on your face in reaction to the movement.

You take it, grateful for his observation. For some reason, squeezing something helps. You might look into why it works that way one day, but the chances of you actually doing so are low. Very, very low. Especially considering that you're still illiterate.

Maybe you can make your brother help you.

“Cronus, you- Cronus, you can stop squeezing my hand now. Nothing is happening. Kankri isn't even on the bed anymore,” Tavros wiggles his fingers around in a sad attempt to escape your grasp.

You let go of his hand and look over to find Kankri, discovering that he had gotten off the bed and was busying himself over the bucket of water. He rung blood of out the rags, trying to clean them as best as he could.

Knelt on the floor, he seemed tiny. Not because he was unusually small, but because you were on a bed, and he was hunched over a bucket. It still gave the impression of him being small, which you weren't sure how to feel about.

“Kankri,” you start, but he doesn't stick around long enough for you to finish. He quickly wrings out the rags and folds them as he exits, going down the hall.

Tavros pulls his hand away from yours slowly while you stare at the door, “He's just mad,” he explains, “We’re from the same village. He has… episodes. He once stood in the center of town preaching about treating women as equals or something for three days. He even got a bucket of… well, feces, thrown at him once. He still came back the next day. He's really stubborn.”

You nod slowly, understanding a little. He's still not over you invading his bed. On the bright side, he was nice enough to help you out. Now that you think about it though, he could have just done that to get on your good side. You guess that you'll see.

“I don't want to leave yet,” you turn your head back towards Tavros, “Everyone will give me that look. You know which one. I don't want to deal with that yet.”

Tavros, you assume, knows more than anyone about “that look”, so he just nods, “Stay as long as you want, as long as it doesn't get you into more trouble.”

The smile that he gives you isn't one of sympathy, but one of what you assume is friendliness. He seems like a very friendly man, and his crooked teeth just give him a more childish look. His incisors stick out further than the rest of his teeth, and he has a tiny gap between his two front teeth.

You were lucky enough to be born with relatively nice teeth, and you've only chipped one, so you look alright. Even though Tavros doesn't have a perfect smile, something about it is comforting.

You reach out and grab his hand once again, but this time you bring it up to your cheek, holding it there and slipping your fingers in between his.

Tavros’ smile falters a bit, likely confused, and you can see his eyes widen as you lean forward. That is the last thing you see before you close your eyes and connect your lips with his, not caring that his are chapped and need to be taken care of, or that he isn't moving his in response to yours.

The lack of a response gives you more of a reason to focus on other things. Such as how you're kissing a boy, something that is much less than okay. If you think that your back hurts now, you can only imagine what would happen if your father found out about this.

Pulling back, you stay close, eyes just barely cracking open to look at the stable keep.

There he sits, eyes still wide open and unblinking. It prompts you to move back further, and when you allow his hand to move away from his face he promptly faints.

You'd be offended if you didn't understand that you just surprised him with something practically illegal.

He fell onto his back, which makes it easier on you. You don't have to move him to settle him into his bed correctly.

With an annoyed sigh, you stand, ignoring the throbbing in your back as you pull a sheet over Tavros and pull his curtains shut. You have no idea how long he’ll be out, but you don't want the sun to be what wakes him back up.

You gather your shirt and crown, slipping them both on but leaving the shirt unbuttoned to avoid pressure on your back. You leave the room just like Kankri did, keeping your eyes downcast and planning to go to your bedroom.

There is plenty for you to sit around and panic about on your own now more than ever. You could have potentially just gotten yourself excommunicated, though you doubt that Tavros would be so uncaring to do such a thing. It'd be better for him and his family for you to stay a prince and heir to the throne. 

Maids and other servants don't approach you as you travel through the halls and up the stairs, and you encounter nobody all the way to your big, feather stuffed bed. You collapse onto your stomach.

You're unsure how much time goes by before your brother climbs into the bed with you, squirming up under one of your arms and facing away from you.

He had odd ways of showing that he cares.


	3. Chapter 3

Days have always passed faster than you want them to, and the days following getting public lashings are no exception. You do a lot of staying holed up in your room, maids bringing you food when you need it, and the castle nurse coming by to check on your back once a day

You don't like her very much. You'd rather have Kankri showing up in your room at the crack of dawn to clean your back, as weird as it may sound.

Tavros has been out of sight since your little incident with him, and you don't know if he's avoiding you or you just haven't been out enough to see him. He may not even remember it since he fainted. You can’t decide if you want him to or not, though you know it’d be better for you if he didn’t. Having to explain why you kissed a man might be a little stressful.

You could always pass it off as you being out of it from the pain of your back, but not everyone would believe that. Tavros definitely wouldn’t. He was there after all, and you did sort of do some things to lead up to it. It wasn’t just spontaneous.

You still haven’t figured out exactly why you did it either. Sure, he was a fairly attractive man, and he was nice, and he was letting you hold his hand for completely platonic reasons, but you kissed him. Kissing is a pretty big jump from friendly hand holding.

Part of you wishes that you could take it all back, but you’ve found that deep down, you just want to go back and tell him to figure out how to fix up his lips so you can do it again.

You’re beginning to worry that kissing a man wasn’t just a one time thing.

That is a terrible thing. Terrible enough that if you would get caught, you could be excommunicated. That is, if your father didn’t find out first and kill you. You have no doubts that he would. He’d probably make the entire castle gather outside just to see your head tumble into a basket at his hand. How a man can be so cruel is beyond you.

Today is the first day that you’re going to be required to leave your room. Once a week you and your father have a meeting. It’s more of a discussion about current problems, and in the extra time that you have, he talks all about what it’s like to be king, and how you need to handle it.

You plan on ignoring a lot of it as usual.

What you’re least excited for is how he’s most likely going to completely avoid the subject of whipping you, and won’t even ask how your back is doing. He did that the last time this happened, though it was some time ago, and that time he didn’t feel the need to make it public.

You’ve planned a few things to do afterwards. Find Kankri and ask him about the stitches on your back. You want them out as soon as possible. The you will track down the man that spit on a knight the day he arrived. He seems like the kind of man that you’d want to meet, and you haven’t gotten to formally do so yet.

Tavros is something that you’re still unsure about. You’re going to give yourself a little more time to think before confronting him, and you just hope that your impulsive self doesn’t see him and do something rash.

Your back has healed enough to allow you to wear shirts without much trouble, so you slip one on while you get ready to leave your room. Your crown follows, as you know your father always wants you to wear it.

It isn’t long before you head out, going down the two flights of stairs and to the throne room. As much as you don’t want to go there, that’s where you always meet, so it’s where you must go. You take your time going down the stairs, not wanting to rush and get there any sooner than you have to.

Once you reach the first floor, you stand outside of the throne room doors, take a deep breath, and push them open. Walking inside with the most confidence you can muster, you look at your father sitting in his throne. The one that you were leaned over just a few days prior while he took out his anger on your back.

You approach him, sitting down in your own seat, and looking over at your dad. He sighs, and for a second you think he’s going to apologize. He does not.

“Cronus, what are your thoughts on expanding the kingdom?” He looks ahead, not turning towards you while he speaks.

You think for a second before responding, “What you’re really saying is that you want to either marry me off, or start a war.”

He nods. What a way to start a conversation. You know that he isn’t going to marry you off. He doesn’t like you enough, nor does he think that you’d be able to keep a marriage long enough for him to actually take another kingdom either. His hair is already greying, so it’s clear that he doesn’t have much time to be a healthy man left. 

“I plan on hosting a banquet. I will invite the royal family from Pelion, nobles, the usual, and we’ll have a celebration. It’ll hopefully warm them up to the idea, and then I can discuss it with them afterwards. I’ve already told the maids to prepare for it in a week,” he explains, making weak hand gestures.

You sigh, nodding, “You should let the servants attend this time,” you suggest, “The king of Pelion is all about being friendly, remember? They’d like to see us welcoming the… less fortunate.”

You’re not actually trying to help your father have a better chance of appeasing the other royal family. You’re trying to figure out a way to make up with Tavros and Kankri. You’re pretty sure that they’ll like to attend a royal banquet. Plus, that means that they’ll get more formal clothes. Kankri will like that, you’re positive.

“That’s not a bad idea,” he nods, “I’ll consider it. For now there are a few things I’d like you to do.”

Go figure. No compliments, just work. You shouldn’t have expected expected anything more. You actually can't remember the last time your father complimented you on anything other than your hair. You haven't even gotten a nice comment on your posture, something he disciplined you for a very long time about. Now it's as if he doesn't care.

“What night those things be?” You lean back in your seat, waiting for him to task you with something boring or pointless. You're careful to lean back slowly though, mostly on your shoulders rather than your back.

“I need you to take a small group out to survey Pelion tomorrow. I need more information about its resources. Take someone two can document your findings. The rest of the group is completely up to you,” he moves to stand, pushing himself up out of his throne, “The only other thing I need from you is to put serious thought into marriage. You'll have to find a wife sooner than later, and it may end up being one of the women from Pelion.”

With that, your father heads towards the doors, leaving the room without a goodbye. You lean forward, putting your face in your hands. You're tired, you're sore, and you want nothing more than to just have a day to do absolutely nothing. That won't be happening anytime soon.

You wait a few minutes before you follow your dad’s path out of the room, heading down the hall towards the library. It seems that you have more of a reason to talk to Kankri now than just asking about your back.

Mumbling to yourself as you go down the hall, you think about who you might take along tomorrow. Kankri for sure, since he can read and write, but otherwise you’ll need to put some thought into it.

It'd be a good idea to have another man about your size with fighting experience, just in case. It can't be a knight though. You won't even wear your crown when you go. You've always liked to make surveying missions as undercover as possible. It's not always necessary, but it makes things more fun.

You're sure to find a group that will work by tomorrow.

Right now you're just focused on getting to the library, and making a wrong turn right into Kankri's room. You never focused much on how close the library was to the throne room, but you find that it's closer than you expect, and you get to Kankri's door pretty quickly.

You knock twice before you push the door open, not waiting for a response. “Kankri, could you look at my back?” You look into the room just as you finish your question, and in just enough time to see Kankri fall off of his bed. You aren't sure what happened to cause that, but you burst into laughter as soon as the door closes. You have to lean over and rest your hands on your knees to keep yourself up.

Kankri huffs and puffs across the room as he gets up from the floor and picks up a book that had fallen with him, untangling his feet from his sheet. That must have been what triggered the fall.

“Take your shirt off,” he commands, his face tinted a light shade of red from embarrassment. His hands move up to sweep his hair out of his face, “If you're just here to ask about the sutures, you aren't getting them out yet.”

Unbuttoning your shirt, you just laugh, “While I was going to ask that, I also have something else.”

Your shirt is laid off to the side, along with the plain white one you wore under it. Kankri makes quick work of unwrapping your bandages, circling around to your backside as he balls the bandages up. You can feel his fingers brush across fading bruises and the still red and inflamed skin along the stitches.

“What was the other thing you wanted, Cronus?” Kankri mumbles, obviously more focused on your back than his own voice.

“I am to go out to Pelion tomorrow and survey the land. I need someone to document our findings when we go. You're the first person I thought of. Would you like to join me?” You raise your arms above your head while you speak, as Kankri pushed one up and expected you to do the rest.

For a moment, he’s silent. You assume he’s thinking, or just distracted with your wounds, but he does eventually respond.

“While I don’t think you should be travelling much yet with these stitches, I understand that you likely don’t have much of a choice on the matter. So I will go with you. Both to document findings, and take care of your back if anything is to happen,” he moved away from you, pulling open a drawer, you turn to watch him, but he twists you back around as soon as he has what he was looking for.

All that you got to see was a little bowl wrapped in a rag, but Kankri answers your unspoken question with ease.

“It’s ointment. To help it heal faster,” he’s quiet as he gets a glob of the ointment on his fingers and carefully smears it over both of the stitched wounds, just using the extra on the one that he left open. “I do hope that you don’t plan on taking only me. You’ll need more people. Perhaps someone to tend the horses? Assuming that we’ll be taking horses, that is.”

At the mention of horses the first thing to come to mind is Tavros. He is a stable keep after all, and now that you think about it, he’d be perfect for you undercover troupe. He’s missing a leg! You doubt that anyone would expect a prince to be travelling with someone who’s missing a leg, since it’s usually more of a liability than anything. The only issue with Tavros is that you still need to build up the confidence to confront him.

Kankri stays quiet, most likely giving you time to think while he rubs the ointment into your back where he sees fit. You’d be lying if you said you weren’t enjoying it. There were parts that were sore to the touch, but overall it just felt like a massage.

“Kankri,” you turn your head to look over your shoulder, though there isn’t much of Kankri that you’re able to see besides his hair.

“Yes?” He says.

“What was the name of the man that spit on the knight and helped you carry water to Tavros’ room? I remember him telling me that he was skilled in fighting, and I’d rather take him along than a knight.”

Kankri stops his hands on your back for a moment, but continues when he talks, “I believe his name was Dirk. He didn’t give me a family name.”

Even just a first name should be enough to find him, so you just nod and allow Kankri to work on your back in silence for the next few minutes. He instructs you to let it dry for a moment before trying to slip a shirt back on, so you slouch over, taking your crown off to run your fingers over the gems in it while you wait.

Kankri says nothing, and neither do you, the two of you just have a comfortable moment of silence. Kankri puts the little bowl away and grabs you shirts holding them out to you after what he must think is enough time for your back to dry off. It isn’t, but you don’t have the heart to tell him otherwise. You just take the shirts and give him a little smile as thanks. He does not return it. He instead moves to sit on the edge of his bed, looking at you expectantly.

“Well?” He asks, looking at you like you’re dull.

“Well what?”

“When do you plan to have this trip?” He rolls his eyes, but now you understand.

“Oh, well I was told to go tomorrow, so I figured that we could leave at sunrise. Meet by the stables. We will be taking horses,” you’re too impatient to wait to put your shirts back on, so you do, starting with the undershirt and following with the other. You slip your crown back on while you’re at it.

“That’s rather short notice, don’t you think?” Kankri raises a brow, looking your way once your shirts are back on.

“Yes, but like you said, I don’t have much of a choice,” you shrug, already regretting putting your shirts on so soon. Your undershirt is sticking to your back in all the wrong ways.

“Well, Cronus, I was told to be in the library today, so unless you want to be in here alone, I suggest you be on your way to collect the rest of our little troupe,” he makes a shooing motion towards the door, “And then you may want to think about what exactly we’ll be looking for. We shouldn’t go in blind.”

Kankri stands, brushing himself off despite not having done anything to get dirty, and looks up at you. “If you’d like to impress your father, I suggest looking further into the royal family. You could potentially learn something interesting. I can only assume that you’re being sent to survey the land because your father wants it. Maybe you could get a head start on his plan if you study.”

WIth that, Kankri brushes past you and is out the door, going to his station in the library. You stand there for a moment and consider what he said, but decide to worry about it more later. For now you need to continue assembling your group. You guess you’ll confront Tavros next, and then try to track down Dirk.

You follow Kankri out the door not long after he goes, but he’s already in the library once you’re in the hall, so you just start walking. Further towards the West wing of the castle, towards the stables, and towards Tavros.

***

You have absolutely no idea how long you’ve been standing outside of Tavros’ door. You know that it’s been long enough for a maid to ask if you were okay, which you just nodded in response to. You’re just fine for the most part. You’re just a little nervous.

What if he remembers that you kissed him? What if he threatens to tell someone? What excuse could you possibly make up to cover for yourself?

You could say that you were drunk, or that the pain made you woozy and that you didn’t remember it. The believability of either of those aren’t too bad. You’ll just have to see how it goes once you talk to him, and you will talk to him. Just not quite yet. 

Tavros is in his room today, not working in the stables yet. You’ve heard him inside moving around, doing who knows what. Hopefully he doesn’t know that you’re standing outside his door like some sort of huntsman waiting for his trap to spring. You’re just trying to pull yourself together, not trap him and feed him to your family.

You wouldn’t even know where to begin with that, but that’s beside the point. You’ve got things to do, and this is one of them.

It’s your fault for being so impulsive anyway. You don’t even know what you were thinking or why you did it. You don’t even know how you’d explain it to him if he wasn’t mad at you.

This is why you’ve been standing around for so long. You haven’t the slightest clue what you’re doing. You don’t know what to say or how to act, and you’re scared because of that.

Just as you raise your hand and curl your fingers into a fist to knock on the door, it swings open. Tavros stands there, looking straight at you. He’s an inch or two shorter than you are, but you can hardly tell. It still seems like your eyes are level enough for him to stare straight into them, which he does. 

With a stutter, he speaks, “I was going to go ask the tailor about my pants, but you probably want to talk. At least that’s what would make the most sense. I don’t know what else you’d want.”

You nod silently, stepping towards him, to which he reacts by stepping out of the doorway to let you inside. You enter, watching him close the door behind you.

“First, before anything else, I need you to come along with Kankri and I in the morning to Pelion. We’re surveying the land for my father,” you blurt out before he has a chance to say anything, “We’re leaving at sunrise and we’re meeting at the stables. We’ll be gone for most of the day.”

Tavros stands still for a minute, looking a bit dumbfounded. Slowly, he nods.

“Isn’t your back still hurt though?” He asks.

You honestly have no clue how to respond. You want to gush about how sweet he is, but you know better. So instead you think that it’s a brilliant idea to just start taking your shirts off again so that he can see the progress you’ve made healing himself.

Again, your shirt comes off, followed by the white undershirt. Your crown is discarded as well, laying next to the small pile of shirts that you made on the corner of Tavros’ bed. You turn around, letting Tavros have a good look at whatever he may like to look at on your back. You stand there for a moment, looking out the small window in the room while you give him a chance to look.

Before you get to turn back around you feel his hand, careful as ever, laid on your back. It traces around the red swelling of some of the stitches, and you involuntarily flex your back. It almost tickles. His hand pulls away, and you turn around, looking down at him.

“Kankri doesn’t think I should be going, but I don’t have a choice. He’s going to come along too, so if anything happens he can fix it,” you feel a bit naked having your shirt off, as you usually wear one all of the time, save for bathing and when you have to take care of injuries. Having it off in front of others is almost looked down upon. Not that you care. If you were permitted, you’d probably walk around the castle without one all of the time.

Nodding, Tavros takes a step back.

“I’ll go with you.”

 

That was easier than you expected, and the kiss hasn’t even been brought up. Maybe he doesn’t remember it, or maybe he just doesn’t want to talk about it. Either way, you don’t think that you’re going to talk to him about it unless he mentions it first. It may not be the right thing to do, but it’s the easiest. You prefer to go the easy route as often as possible.

“That was easy,” you laugh, “I’ll see you in the morning then, Tavros.”

You grab your undershirt and slip it back on with a sigh, but as soon as you have it on Tavros speaks up again.

“Do you remember anything… not normal? From yesterday?” He clearly doesn’t want to just openly ask you if you remember kissing him, but he’s hinting at it for sure. He might think that you were drunk, like the excuse you came up with. Or maybe he thinks he might have dreamt it?

“Not normal is a very vague description,” you hesitate, wanting to know more about what he thinks.

“I mean…” He huffs, “I think you kissed me.”

Frozen for a second, you just stare at him. You’re having a bit of a mental breakdown, but through it you manage to come up with a terrible way to communicate with him.

“No. Why would I do that? Don’t be silly,” you shake your head, making an attempt to play it off as if it didn’t happen. You can almost see the tension in the room grow. It’s not a very comfortable situation for either of you.

“Okay- yes. I must have imagined it. Ignore me, I don’t know what I was thinking,” he shakes his head, a hand resting on his forehead.

Hurriedly, you slip on your other shirt and your crown, anxious to get out of the situation for now. You don’t want to slip up and make Tavros think that you did actually kiss him, if he doesn’t already. “Sunrise,” you say as you slip out the door, probably red and the face.

Instead of standing around and trying to figure out what just happened, you’re going to distract yourself by trying to find Dirk. You find it best to begin at the library, since the records of everyone that comes and goes are kept there. The room he was given should probably be somewhere in there.

The walk doesn’t take very long when you’re nearly jogging just to put distance between yourself and the stable keeper's room. Only a few minutes, and you stand outside the library doors for another few seconds to calm yourself. When you enter, all eyes are on you for a moment, and they slowly turn away. You walking into a room isn’t a big deal. When you enter, you’re just minding your own business. When your father enters, everyone has to be on their best behavior or someone could end up shackled to a wall for a day.

Your father is most likely the most disliked person in the kingdom. It sort of disgusts you that he can be so cruel. When you’re the king you’re going to make plenty of changes.

There is no central desk in the library, only workers walking around, some with papers to keep track of what goes where or who takes what. There is a section towards the back where cabinets sit filled with the history of the castle and the royal families that came before yours. Somewhere in those cabinets is a stack of papers that state where current residents are roomed and stationed. It'll just take a little looking to find exactly what you need.

Navigating your way through the relatively small library is easy, and you just go straight towards the cabinets, opening them up one at a time and skimming over the documents that look like they've been added most recently. There is of course a bit of a problem with you being here, you know the format of the papers you're looking for. You're confident that you'll find them.

One of the librarians walks over and asks if you need any help, but you deny their assistance. This is supposed to work as a distraction after all, and it isn't much of a distraction if you just get to stand their and wait.

You wait for them to walk away before young continue your self made quest, and it's just your luck that you find the papers in the very last cabinet. You pull a page off the top of the stack, scanning through the list of names one at a time, careful not to miss anything. The name “Dirk” only appears towards the bottom. It's in parentheses next to Theodoric. You remembers seeing that on the list a few days back. Dirk must just be an alias.

He, unfortunately, was given a room on the East wing, which is the complete opposite side of the castle. That’s closer to where the smithy is located. You never thought that you’d wish that it was closer to you, but now you do. You’ve always disliked the hot metal smell, and sometimes you can even smell burning leather from discarded gloves, which you think is even worse. You have a very picky nose.

Sliding the paper back into the cabinet and closing it, you make a silent decision to avoid asking Dirk to join you tomorrow for as long as possible. Not a great idea, but one that you aren’t going back on.

You’ll just need to find something else to do to busy yourself.


End file.
